Response to new proposed Hitchhiker book
notanotherthing.com
notanotherthing.com
If you don't want to read it - then don't!
If you don't want to consider it part of the "canon" - then don't!
If other people do - then that's up to them!
It's not complicated...
So it's not just some random fans, it's some people who knew the man well, and care deeply for him and the memories he left them.
Add to that the fact that it will be a moderate to huge money spinner, and they already know that there will be people rabidly opposed.
What's the point?
And why is this Hacker News?
Not much, it's just that, unfortunately Douglas Adams died way too young and that every time someone releases another book that carries his name somewhere on the cover you get your hopes up for another glimpse of the masters wit and insight only to be disappointed.
> And why is this Hacker News?
it isn't. But by commenting on it you make it so ;)
He wrote five-and-a-half books in the Hitchhiker series, wrote for Doctor Who and Monty Python, wrote an additional two novels, two nonfiction comedy works, and a book on environmental activism, programmed several video games, launched a web site that was a precursor to Wikipedia, got to play with Paul McCartney, and wrote a whole ton of tech columns. That is not an unfulfilled life. That is a man who worked himself to the bone and lived happily.
Sorry, but I'm really pissed off that Hitchhikers fans will so frequently worship Adams without knowing a thing about the man. He wasn't a brilliant writer; he was good, fairly dextrous, but nothing special. HGTTG was probably the worst thing he ever wrote. What makes him incredible was that he was obsessed with learning things, and that at his best he could make you want to learn things along with him, be it atheism or environmentalism or Macintoshes, and he could make you laugh at the same time as you were learning. But no, that's been thrown out the window for teens and twentysomethings who quote him in spurious British accents, and who insist that writing five books in a series is at all not enough, or that his five books are somehow canon. It's the same frustration I get at people who quote Monty Python but haven't heard of Fawlty Towers.
Anyway, not Hacker News, carry on and ignore the deranged ranter.
Hehe, not from where you're standing. But from where I'm standing 49 is way too young and a tragedy.
> That is not an unfulfilled life. That is a man who worked himself to the bone and lived happily.
I'm aware of that.
> Sorry, but I'm really pissed off that Hitchhikers fans will so frequently worship Adams without knowing a thing about the man.
That's an assumption on your part that you probably can not prove.
> HGTTG was probably the worst thing he ever wrote.
I think that it has to be seen in the context of when it was written.
Personally my favorite book by him is The long dark teatime of the soul.
> Anyway, not Hacker News, carry on and ignore the deranged ranter.
Why, you thought it was worth writing, I might as well read it :)
Oh, and don't step on the bits of whalemeat ;) (in a spurious British accent)
I've got a weird idea of death, perhaps. I don't like it when it happens, but I don't see it as a tragedy.
Personally my favorite book by him is The long dark teatime of the soul.
Yes! Very much. It was unexpectedly clever.
Why, you thought it was worth writing, I might as well read it
Sometimes I worry that I put too much effort into posting on HN. I enjoy writing, and I try to make it relevant to the conversation, but I've been frequently scolded for it here, which I think is a shame.
I love Eliezer's writing. What I meant, though, was that while I wish Adams hadn't died, he died with a lifetime's work fulfilled. The only deaths I really find tragic are the ones that stop something big from progressing, something that required one man or woman to push it forward.
Furthermore: It is not incredibly fucking tied to Adams's writing (note that his name is AdamS and not Adam, kthx). There is only one thing that remotely relates to anything he wrote, and that's the "whooshing deadline" bit, and that was terribly unsubtle. Douglas Adams never wrote "it's okay to say 'that's all'", or "So, could you not, please?" It's just some jackass being snarky.
This is not fucking Hacker News in the same way Monty Python is not fucking Hacker News. I might like John Cleese's use of language and movement but I'm not submitting any dead fucking parrot sketches, and I'm offended by your perversion of the word "hack" to defend your shitty submission, and by the fact that for a self-proclaimed Douglas Adams fan you're so fucking terrible at defending the man as a writer.
This is not Hacking. At best it is nerdy. It is not News. It refers to an article that is a year and a day old. It is not valuable, it adds nothing interesting to the conversation, it is not interesting to look at, and so the only conversation of value to be had here is that Hacker News is jumping sharks all over the place, and I blame you for thinking that this was at all worth a moment of anybody's time. Unless the new standard for relevant content is "It uses Helvetica," this will be flagged and you will be made to feel momentary embarrassment before we forget this and go back to arguing over Twister or whatever it's called.
Eoin can't pull it off.